Will this season ever end? Playing in a rare Sat-Sun WCHA matchup, the St. CLoud Huskies swept MTU Huskies at the National Hockey Center in St. Cloud. Sat's Game: MTU 0 0 1 0 - 1 StC 1 0 0 1 - 2 (OT) Ist Period: StC Paradise 11 (lund) 8:07 shg 3rd Period: MTU B. Peterson 20 (P. Mikesch) 1:37 OT StC: Gagnon 18 (Holcrin) 3:47 Saves: MTU Ram 12 16 13 4 - 46 StC Sjerven 3 10 10 0 - 23 powerplays: MTU 0 of 6 StC 0 of 8 Stars: 3rd: Sjerven 2nd: Ram 1st: Gagnon Superior Player: Ram ------------------------------------------- Sunday night: MTU 1 2 0 - 3 StC 1 3 0 - 4 1st Period: MTU B. Peterson 21 (Garvey) 11:14 StC Santare 6 (Holem) 16:33 2nd Period StC Holcrin (Santare) 4:25 ppg StC Gruba ( Lieber) 12:20 MTU Machecek (Figliomeni) 14:35 StC Johnson (unassisted) 17:37 MTU Perrault (B. Peterson, Lebel) ppg Saves: MTU Caraveggio 16 9 13 - 38 StC Sjerven 4 8 8 - 20 Powerplays: MTU 1 of 4 StC 1 of 11 Stars: 3rd Santare 2nd Caraveggio 1st Holcrin Superior Player Caraveggio Commentary: Of the two games, Saturday night's was the best. What must MTU do to get a win? Apparently, a shutout is the only answer. Ram gave it his best. The first score was a short handed breakway by Lund and Paradise. Ram stopped the puck with his glove but the ricochet went in. MTU's lone score came in the 3rd when B. Peterson with men hanging on him managed to take a pass from Mikesch and place the puck past Sjerven. Then in the OT, Gagnon took a long shot from the blue line. Again Ram got a piece of the puck but it went through on the lower left side. In over three minutes of overtime play, MTU did not get off a shot on goal. In Sunday night's game, Referee Mike Brant called the game completely different from Saturday night. Since he seem to play the MTU end, his calls were predominantly anti-MTU. MTU lost the game though, not by calls, but by poor playing. MTU's power play killing kept them in the game but could not take advantage of opportunities. As Coach Mancini said after the game, if a team is going to win, it can not count on doing so in the last few minutes of the game or in OT. It would be nice to be up by two or three goals at least some time during the game. MTU has not done this since November. MTU cam out well in the first period but lost confidence when they got scored on short handedly and then took a series of penalties. The first goal of the game came when Brent Peterson intercepted a pass meant for a cherry picking Gagnon from Lund. St Cloud did a lot of cherry picking and this time they paid for it. Sjerven blocked Peterson's first shot but Peterson followed up with a scoring rebound. St. Cloud's Holem brought the puck to Caraveggio's right but couldn't fake him out. Passing the puck to Santare on the left side, Santare got off a quick shot before Caraveggio could react. Holcrin (I doubt I am spelling this name correctly) on a powerplay shuttled the puck between Santare and himself and finally took a scoring shot. St. Cloud's Tony Gruba, with Hanchuk hnaging on him puck a shot on net when Caraveggio was crashed out of the net by another St. Cloud player (no call). MTU's Figgy stole a pass and shot the net. Sjerven's rebound was followed up by Machacek's scoring shot. Then MTU's Jason Wright gave up the puck directlyu in front of the MTU net to Eric Johnson who knew exactly what to do with it. The last score was a powerplay goal by Perrault just 8 seconds after a slashing call on Markstrom. Hopefully, next week end will put MTU out of its misery for this season as they meet the Wildcats from Northern Michigan on a home and home stint. Then a new season with the playoffs ... (Dare I hope?) Walt Olson MTU